


Underneath Andromeda

by unsafe_business_practices



Series: i'd rather be here than falling off the pages of history [1]
Category: The Bright Sessions (Podcast)
Genre: F/M, Longing, Mark is in the past, Oh my god so much longing, Sam is a horny motherfucker, Smut, Sort Of, season 1/season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:53:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23355760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unsafe_business_practices/pseuds/unsafe_business_practices
Summary: Andromeda, a mythical princess who was chained to a rock as a sacrifice. She was rescued by Perseus, who upon seeing her trapped instantly fell in love. Legend says that Athena placed her in the sky as a constellation after her death to commemorate her husband's great deeds. The constellation is also known as the Chained Maiden.Sam knows she is chained to her past the same ways she knows her heart will race if she ever thinks about driving again, the way she knows her hands will get clammy when she approaches a crowd, the way she knows her stomach will swoop every time she manages to visit Mark.It’s hard to break free when you are your own prison warden.
Relationships: Samantha Barnes/Mark Bryant
Series: i'd rather be here than falling off the pages of history [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1680913
Kudos: 11





	Underneath Andromeda

Sam knows she is chained to her past the same ways she knows her heart will race if she ever thinks about driving again, the way she knows her hands will get clammy when she approaches a crowd, the way she knows her stomach will swoop every time she manages to visit Mark.

It’s hard to break free when you are your own prison warden. 

Mark is chained to the past, too, through no fault of his own, but Sam can’t help feeling like she wouldn’t mind being trapped here with him. She can’t bring herself to tell Dr. Bright that she sometimes fantasizes about being frozen in the past with him, that she thinks about what it would be like to trace his skin and kiss his lips, that she wonders how they might feel under her lips in this almost corporeal form. She can’t taste in the past, but if she thinks hard enough, she can imagine his.

It’s been a long time since she’s imagined being kissed like this. Her anxiety mostly gets the best of her - she is horrified at the possibility of crackling away to a time long ago while encased in someone’s arms - but there was Jennie from coding club in college who she thought might kiss like pink Moscato and fireworks, and she still thinks Greg from the bookstore would lay her out on the bed and explore her with fingers as gentle as if she were an precious manuscript if she would let him.

She always blushes furiously when she encounters either of them. 

With Mark, though, she can’t bring herself to feel embarrassed at fantasizing about the feel of his hands on hers. She can’t bring herself to hide her face when he looks back at her with a brightness in his eyes that she cannot identify as either hope or sorrow. Perhaps it’s both.

Perhaps they are doomed to sit, inches apart, and never touch.

And  _ God _ , how that kills her, how that wrenches her open from depths she did not know existed. They lay side by side and stare at the sky, and she cannot help but weep at the knowledge that they are no closer to one another than they are to the stars.

They talk about it - or, well, they talk  _ around  _ it. Neither can truly imagine a day where they’re free, but Sam knows better than anyone that at least they have dreams. She tells him about how she’d like to see the country someday, maybe get her PhD, that eventually she’d like to kiss someone outside her head. He tells her about how he longs for the feeling of sand between his toes as he watches the waves, how he aches, so endlessly touch-starved, to be held by someone,  _ anyone _ , how he’d love to take pictures of the sun setting behind her. He tells her about his sister and his favorite movies and how he misses hot chocolate more than he ever thought a grown man could. 

Sometimes, when Sam returns home, she burns hot chocolate on the stove and imagines the kiss of her chipped mug is the touch of his lips. 

They talk about the future. They don’t talk about  _ theirs _ . Sam doesn’t know if she can have one yet, so tied to the past that she is, though she can feel herself inching toward it, breaking the chains one by one. 

Mark doesn’t even know if he’ll see the twenty-first century again. 

Sam  _ wants _ to think about a future for  _ them _ , though, even if she can’t picture one for  _ her _ . She wants to think about kissing him softly and laying him into the pile of soft blankets that clutter her bed, wants to think about the heat of his skin. She wants to know what he smells like, wants to know how his eyes will twinkle when he presses back against her. She wants to hold his hand and kiss outside a restaurant, wants to be pressed against a car door warmed by the sun, wants to know the freckles on his skin as well as they know the constellations. 

She wants, she wants, she  _ wants _ . 

She can’t imagine ever wanting so much before. When she closes her eyes, she can practically feel his heat hovering above her as if he has somehow transcended time again to find her. Hot, wet kisses down her neck, her chest, between her thighs. She thinks they’d laugh - Mark always has that mischievous smile, always has the right joke to make her grin - and so she lets herself relax into the touch she pretends is his, lets herself be rolled over the precipice with the image of him burned in her brain. 

Luckily, Sam’s walls are not thin. 

It almost feels like freedom. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please let me know if you enjoyed!


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